Introduction: Take a survey of bass fisherman of their favorite topwater bait and some type of frog might very well win. As far as topwater strikes from a big ole bucket mouth go, few can rival that of a beast rising from beneath a matt of dense cover to annihilate your bait. Trouble is, the hook up ratio of such a strike is pretty darn low. Whether that is caused by the cover you're fishing, the rod, reel and line you're using, or something about the frog itself, there are a lot of factors that have to go your way to get that frog fish into the boat.

Introducing Evergreen International's Kicker Frog.

During ICAST 2010, Morizo Shimizu, pro-staff and lure designer for Evergreen International showed us a bait of which he was very proud - the Kicker Frog. It features a more compact body and something rather unique in today's frog designs - a single, heavy wire hook. Following the show, we found a way to get our hands on some of these baits, and here now is our review of Evergreen International's Kicker Frog!

Evergreen International Kicker FrogSpecifications

Type

Frog

Depth

Surface Lure

Class

Floating

Size

2 1/4"

Weight

1/2 oz

Colors/Patterns

14 (8 in the US)

Hooks

Unknown

MSRP

~$18

Impressions: As we've come to expect with most products built for the Japanese Domestic Market (JDM), the Kicker Frog is smaller than traditional baits of this style. Overall, it is only about two and a quarter inches in length weighs half an ounce. The available colors and patterns range from ultra-realistic to the typical, bright and obnoxious colors.

The Kicker frog is a 2 1/4", 1/2 ounce bait.

Field Tests: Because the Kicker Frog is small and somewhat unconventional, I threw the bait on very unconventional gear. Instead of using braid, I used ten pound test Fluorocarbon. Instead of a big, stout fishing rod, I fished it on a G.Loomis NRX 852C JWR. And instead of a powerful, bulletproof reel, I used a Conquest 51DC. We took to the waters of Clear Lake, California and the California Delta to test things out.

Ready to go.

Casting: The Kicker Frog, while small in stature is actually somewhat standard in terms of weight. Snag Proof's Bobby's Perfect Frog is rated as a half ounce bait and so is the Spro Dean Rojas Bronzeye 60. Other popular frogs like River2Sea's Ish's Phattie Frog weigh in at five eighths of an ounce.

The weight at the back of the Kicker Frog includes a ring for
the attachment of spinning blades (purchased separately).

Bottom line is casting a half ounce frog bait is not a difficult task and Evergreen's Kicker Frog falls right in line with these other popular models. Fished on the unconventional combo of a 2 powered NRX stick and fluorocarbon line spooled onto a Conquest 51DC, my biggest worry how not to spool the reel and lose my bait!

A look at the underside of the mouse pattern.

Retrieve: One of the reasons for the recommendation to use braided line when fishing a frog, is the fact the line floats. Fluorocarbon is the worst line to use on any type of topwater bait because the line is so dense it sinks, so instead of your bait working on the surface, the tendency is for it to follow your line and be pulled down into the water.

Mouse or frog? Apparently both work!

So on my unconventional experiment, I fully expected to not be able and work Evergreen's Kicker Frog. I was wrong. This bait swims so easily it didn't matter that I was using fluorocarbon line. It walks, dashes, and darts in a manner that rivals a Zara Spook or other similar, hard bodied cigar baits. Honestly what led me to tie the lure onto this combo was simply a desire to try the bait out and see how it felt. I was too lazy to pull a proper combo out of the rod locker.

There are 14 color options total, eight of which will be
easily available in the States.

But after a few casts, I couldn't put it down. The Kicker Frog was so fun to cast and work with this combo, it became a challenge to see if I could actually catch and land a fish and if not, I wanted to see how badly I'd crash and burn!